Related Articles

Using segments in Google Analytics can be a powerful way to track multiple campaigns. Segments define and track particular sources of traffic and you can set them up directly from the dashboard of your website's traffic overview in Google Analytics. By defining some attributes associated with your campaign you can track clicks to a specific banner on your website. With a custom segment in Google Analytics you can track many kinds of traffic sources.

Create a Custom Segment in Google Analytics

1. Open the Web page that features the banner ad in your Web editor of choice.

2. Create a URL using Google’s URL builder tool (see link in Resources). For the best results, define attributes of your campaign. "Campaign Source" helps define the source of the banner, like AdWords or a custom ad server. "Campaign Medium" identifies the traffic as a banner ad. You can also assign other values for future projects, like “television,” “radio” or “Facebook”. Name your campaign, but keep it short. A unique name that describes your project and is easy to refer to is ideal. This will be how you search for all traffic associated with your banner. The rest of the parameters are optional and only serve to enhance your tracking.

3. Generate and place the URL within your code. Locate the banner code and find the portion that begins with “a href=”. Place the URL you made with Google within the quotation marks directly after the equal sign.

4. Save and upload your file to your Web server.

5. Open Google Analytics and navigate to the dashboard of the site you are doing tracking for. From the dashboard, locate “Advanced Segments” just above the graph and click on it.

6. Define a new custom segment by clicking the “+ New Custom Segment” button. Use “Include” and make sure you add a few “And” statements. You’ll want to “Include Campaign” and use your campaign "Name" and “Medium” to further define your segment. Your segment will save automatically when you are done and you can edit your parameters at any point if you change your campaign or create a new one. When visitors click on your banner ad you will be able to monitor their traffic by searching for the name of your banner campaign or by activating this custom segment.

Things Needed

Google's free URL builder tool

Tips

Use “Campaign Content” to track page views on two competing ads to see which performs the best. Paste the text from each ad and observe the metrics.

Name your segments to refer back to for later.

You can export your data as a CSV for Excel to study offline or share findings with your work group.